Oct 13, 2025
Crouka (Feat. Egil Olsen) | Yōko Kanno
seen from Spain
seen from Germany
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seen from China
seen from Austria
seen from United Kingdom
seen from United States
seen from Malaysia
seen from China
seen from United Kingdom
seen from Australia
seen from United States
seen from South Korea
seen from Russia
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seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
Crouka (Feat. Egil Olsen) | Yōko Kanno
Title: 幻奏幻花、届かずの音色 (Illusionary Music and Illusionary Flowers, Unreaching Tone)
Arrangement: Crouka
Vocals: いずみん
Album: Scattered Destiny
Circle: EastNewSound
Original: Hiroari Shoots a Strange Bird ~ Till When?
Song: Final Legacy (crouka Remix) Artist: FS feat. Selphius Album: Final Legacy Circle: Frozen Starfall
Sunaga T Experience — Собака (Crouka) (2001)
with my sword - 空音 [裏 BEST OF WiNG RED]
Edu vs. CROUKA
This album was created by Sunaga T Experience, as a soundtrack to this mysterious episode.
So proclaims the MC as he introduces us to the world of CROUKA, Sunaga T Experience's debut album. We live in a world where nary a book or Hollywood blockbuster doesn't claim to have been inspired by a true story (cue up dozens of exorcism films), and DJ/producer Tatsuo Sunaga was already pushing this attitude to its illogical conclusion way back in 2001. While technically it's true that CROUKA was inspired by the mid-20th century age of space exploration and the USSR's use of dogs in space probes, one quickly realizes this is all a sham. At the center of this concept album lies a mystery: the disappearance of Soviet probe the Soyuz II, with Colonel Ivan Istonichcoff and his companion, the dog Crouka, on board. It's an improbable yarn ("crouka" meaning "dog" in Russian is a ridiculously large, neon-lit red flag) but it's a great setup for the album and, after so many listens, adds depth to the listening experience.
The album opens with "Istonichcoff (Theme from T.R.A.P.)," a spoken-word house number that describes the Soyuz II incident. It's a rare toe-tapping, head-bopping disco moment that never gets repeated during the rest of the album. The follow up, "It's you," is more representative, a breezy bossa nova with particularly nice plucked guitar touches. The first high of the album comes with "Prologue" and the next track, a cover of The Pretenders "Kid." "Prologue" features a French-speaking woman reading the exact translation of the text from "Istonichcoff" over a virtuoso guitar solo, but this time the story builds further. Istonichcoff, you see, grew up in a farm, and was good with dogs. That's why a dog, Crouka, was chosen to accompany him, rather than a chimpanzee. This added bit of story invites you to interpret "Kid" differently. Could it be about Istonichcoff's first meeting with Crouka, about his tender feelings for this dog that was about to embark on a doomed expedition with him? It's a stretch,but I enjoy the ambiguity in that space. The soft vocals and delicate bossa nova rhythms leave the answer up to us.
The album hits a bit of a duller spot next with the tedious, flamenco inspired "千歳空港." It has some nice guitar work but at just over 9 minutes, it's a little too long. I don't hate "Satellite Beats" as much as Patrick did, since I found myself appreciating the bass line and the random bleeps and scratches that make you feel as if you're moving dials and knobs on a massive space console. Things pick up for me on "C'est Vous Sur Le Pont," one of the two tracks featuring Shibuya-kei singer Emi Necozawa. By now this is the third bossa nova song and you have to give Sunaga T some credit for not making all the songs sound the same despite them all being the same genre. The tempo here is faster, the singing girlishly subpar, at once evoking a ride down the Riviera with the top down and what the dead twins from The Shining would sound like if they sang the chorus to this song. It's adorable, slightly creepy, dripping with melancholy and nostalgia – and danceable, to boot.
"An Announcement For Crouka" brings us back to the concept of this album. This time a Japanese ojiisan narrates the story while a music box waltz plays in the background. The slightly off-kilter flutes in the background dial up the uncanniness, but it's not a particularly memorable track. Like "Prologue," though, it sets up the next track, the instrumental "Crouka." After a short radio dial intro, the song breaks into a slow bossa, this time accentuated by a forlorn shakuhachi repeating a simple motif, while in the background radio static and an oscillator weave in and out of our awareness. This is the part, in my mental movie, where the Soyuz II has been launched into orbit and it surfs the ether as if it were an ocean of gentle waves off the coast of Brazil. Yet there's an undercurrent of loneliness, a little bit of irony because we realize those radio signals are the last thing Istonichcoff and Crouka will hear as they drift into the void.
Next comes "Gemini IV Space Dub," one of my favorite tracks. It's a rather straightforward reggae/dub/cumbia, with a swaying Caribbean bass line layered with echoing beeps and a woman's voice delivering a monologue, this time I believe in Korean. The reverberating vibraphone evokes the vastness of space and the twinkling stars. I don't have much of a mental movie for this part, but if pressed it would probably involve our ill-fated duo floating in free fall, getting used to life in their capsule. While high, probably.
"A Preview" is the beginning of the end for me, since I don't particularly enjoy the three songs that follow it." "A Preview" itself furthers the story, hinting at an accident (or sabotage?) that has left our protagonists in peril. But what exactly? We never find out. Instead we get "Voet Op De Mann," which is kind of too monotonous for me. "Theme From Sunaga 't Experience" picks up a little bit with the jazz groove and Portuguese spoken word (That's five languages so far—post-Shibuya is worldly and pretentia!) bringing a bit of energy to the proceedings. It's still the kind of song that I have to be in the mood for. "Times 24h By Starlight" falls in the same category, and in the same mold as the rest of the album (variations on bossa nova), this time with a rapper and a kooky sample.
"かすかなしるし," the album's closer, is perfection for me. Emi Necozawa's vocals are as weak as they are elsewhere, and I can see how they can detract from some great piano work and a sparsely beautiful arrangement, but they're definitely not a deal breaker for me. Conceptually, this is the end of the road for Istonichcoff and Crouka: stranded in the cosmos, getting busy signals, turning dials and catching near to nothing as they listen for a "faint sign" (the title, in translation) of a rescuer as they drift toward their deaths or, slightly more optimistically in my imagination, eternal stasis in their precociously advanced 1960s spacecraft. The song hovers between resignation and an exhausted desperation. In this context, I actually find it a very effective, very touching repurposing of a love song that, I'm not ashamed to admit frequently moves me to tears. But maybe that's just because I'm tragic.
As a concept album, CROUKA is clearly more than the sum of its parts. Without a mental movie, developed over a decade of listening to it, some of the parts don't hold together. Some parts that might be weaker to some are stronger to me. But that's the beauty of music, isn't it?
Title: Moonlight feels right Arranger: crouka Lyrics: Kaito Vocals: Jinbutsu K Album: Future Love Circle: Halozy Event: Reitaisai 9, 2012 Original: Touhou 8 Imperishable Night／Stage 6A boss Eirin Yagokoro's theme／Gensokyo Millennium ~ History of the Moon
